Grant Dobbe

Greetings from New Tafo, Eastern Region, Ghana.

My homestay community is in Old Tafo, which is just about 6 kilometers away. I just found this internet cafe (wow, I’m a poet and I don’t even know it!), and I think that as long as I have time, I should be able to get to my email at least once a week.

We are well into training, and all of the ups and downs that go with a homestay. I was very lucky; my homestay family is very nice, and I am fortunate to have a room to myself with electricity (what they call lights here). Indoor plumbing, however, is out of the question, but the rainy season and having the neighborhood well just around the corner makes fetching water a very easy chore.

Many of you have been asking about the food — in a word, it’s spicy. There’s also pretty much every kind of tropical fruit you could imagine available in the market here, and we can eat very, *very* well for just about $1 a day. For those of you curious about the currency, one Ghana Cedi (GHC) is roughly equal to $1.

Thank you all for the emails and words of support; I greatly appreciate them and am glad to hear that you are all doing well. I will go back to Old Tafo, draft my emails for next week/time I get over here, and try to get some pictures out.

• Greetings from Accra! #

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Greetings from Accra!

It’s been an incredible journey from Philadelphia to here! We’ve been staying in a dormatory at a local University, and in our first 24 hours, we’ve had a police escort, met with the Minister of Education, and been invited to a party at the U.S. Ambassador’s residence in Accra. Orientation has been fantastic, and we had our first sojourn out into Accra today by ourselves as trainees — no trainers or Peace Corps staff, just us, a few Ghanaian cedis, and a phone number in case we get into trouble.

Accra and the surrounding territory is fantastic. There are palm trees and banana trees almost everywhere you look, and the people are very friendly and willing to help you find almost anything you need. The facilities are very basic. Electricity is very hit and miss, depending on the heat and the available supply, and all of the Trainees are
taking “Navy showers” in order to conserve water. Despite everything we have to get used to — new food, new routines, new methods of transport (expect to see the word “trotro” a *lot*), and new languages (Akwaaba = Welcome in Twi) — I don’t think I’ve heard a single disparaging word from any of my fellow Trainees.

Tomorrow, I leave on my own to visit a PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) at a site in the Volta Region — Peace Corps calls it a Vision Quest — and after 5 days there, I head to the training site to meet up with everyone else. I’ve been advised not to buy a cell phone until I figure out which company has the best coverage at my Volunteer site,
so communication will be limited to e-mail, blog posts, and public phones for the time being.

This has been an amazing experience, and I think it’s only going to get better. I miss you all, and will talk with you all again soon.

• 3.5 hours and counting. #
• Well, here we go. #

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• man, the drupal module section is in dire need of a navigation facelift #
• is in sight of the finish line #

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